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Gallery of the Lamest Technology Mascots Ever
Wired has a gallery of their Lamest Technology Mascots which features some trollish links including Tux and a certain adorable devil. Also featured is the old Java mascot Duke which I always liked, and of course Clippy who these days pretty much exists only in cheesy Top X lists.
No seriously Tux rocks :) *tossing some herring*
After using linux on my desktop and getting minimal support for my non big guy video card (kyroII) and a few other issues that 2 months of my best searching, poking, installing, uninstalling, untarring, posting, and breaking couldn't fix a few years back, I came to realize WHY linux's mascot was a penguin -
And this is sure to get me modded down for flaming, trolling, etc, but its a joke...
Either installing and configuring linux was like an expedition to a cold, stark, barren wasteland, or using it was like living there...
One little aside, my little adventure with linux 5-6 years ago taught me that in order to use a non mainstream OS, you needed to use mainstream hardware... Odd, eh?
Or at least code drivers yourself.
Is it sad that I am more likely to recognize you and your posts by your sig than your name or UID?
I bet a lot of these would fall into a list of the 'Best Tech Mascots Ever'.
Where the hell is Microsoft BOB?
...which is that all computing mascots suck. The whole concept sucks. Unless the target audience of your software is young children, cutesy mascots are just stupid and annoying. A decent logo is useful for branding and recognition of your software, that's fine. But some stupid character to try and create some bizzare link in people's heads between your office software/OS/web browser and some "loveable" creature strikes me as incredibly pointless and just a little bit desperate.
"Sure, on the outside we're a multi-national billion-dollar corporation but, as this green koala clearly shows, on the inside we live in a playful world of whimsy with chocolate hills and marshmallow clouds."
Give me a break
Spelling mistakes, grammatical errors, and stupid comments are intentional.
The reason the FOSS mascots are silly is they were all made by nerds, and they're not trying to sell a product, so you don't have to be able to take it seriously.
Apparently feeling pressured by Tux, supporters of Darwin, an open-source version of the Mac OS, decided they needed their own mascot. The result is Hexley, a curious platypus who in some images is portrayed with horns and a pitchfork -- enough evidence for several intelligent design theorists to offer him as proof of the satanic origins of evolutionary biology. I find this rather a sad entry in their list. They obviously didn't research where he came from at all. Hexley is obviously, to anyone who is familiar with BSD, an attempt to preserve the idea of their mascot (the lovable daemon "Beastie") while referencing Darwin. And as such it is merely a continuation of the BSD heritage and has nothing to do with that penguin at all.
Thing is, the pets.com sock puppet was so popular, he outlasted the company the company that invented him. You still seem him in ads now and then. He even wrote a book.
Now, I personally hate cutesy mascots. When I was helping revise the Java Tutorial, I wanted to barf every time I saw Duke. But there's no denying that they can be effective. Obnoxious marketing is often effective marketing, because it registers.
Also, you're overlooking the fact that deliberate irony is all the rage these days, not least in advertising. The sock puppet, obviously phony and done by a guy who couldn't be bothered to take off his wrist watch, buys into that. (Some of the mascots listed are ironic, but not intentionally.) A few years back, there was an ad campaign for 7-11 phone cards, features Simpsons characters. One sticker had Crusty saying "I heartily endorse this product or event!"
Come to think of it, there's a sort of apologetic subtext to this kind of irony. It's the advertiser's way of saying, "Yeah, we know you're sick of lame ad campaigns. We're sick of them too. But we gotta move the product."
Does Bonzi Buddy count as a mascot?
Although not quite as notorious as Clippy (but probably close) I think this one definitely ranked higher on the "annoying" chart
Yep... I'd like to come out of the closet as a Linux user who doesn't like Tux at all.
What annoys me is that I've never able to satisfactorily put my finger on exactly why I don't like it. Could it be:-
1) Same pose, same expression. Never changes.
2) Glassy-eyed vacant look.
3) Use in certain contexts where it appears unprofessional?
4) Too plasticky? Looks somewhat soulless, like a toy.
5) Childish, but not really "cute".
6) "looks fat, bored, lazy and apathetic and / or immensely stupid" (see parent poster)... that's actually not a bad guess.
Thing is... I like real penguins, and yet this anthropomorphic (or is it?) mascot leaves me cold to the point of active dislike. I don't like this version either; it's just too silly. Basically, I just don't like Tux; although I use Linux, I prefer the BSD Devil mascot. It's far from my favourite cartoon character, but it seem to has some "animation" or "life" to it. Tux doesn't really seem to project any personality; he looks like he's meant to, but it just doesn't come off.
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